Traitors, Foreign And Domestic

On The List, And Other Things

We don’t know whether or not releasing the names of potentially implicated MPs is the right decision.

We want it to be the right decision. We want it to be smart, because viscerally we want to believe that we can toss out some dirty politicians and fix the problem. That’s the story we want to tell ourselves, because it’s easier. It’s easier to toss out some dirty politicians than it is to decide where the much harder lines need to be set.

We have been punting a broader conversation around foreign interference and the role of ethnic minorities in a multi-racial democracy. Our mainstream press indulges in caricature on these issues, as the coverage of Justin Trudeau’s announcement of Indian involvement in the killing of our citizen showed. The fact that Erin O’Toole has been able to for so long claim he lost up to 9 seats due to foreign interference, and not the fact that he took a more hawkish line on China, without much substantial pushback is absurd. It’s more convenient to believe that Chinese interference flipped seats than it is for many white commentators to wrestle with the fact that the issues that animate the Ottawa bubble don’t necessarily animate all parts of the country.

Have politicians crossed lines and in some cases broken the law? Possibly, although having intelligence saying so is not the same as evidence, nor proven evidence. Did every MP listed in the redacted version commit the same level of offence? Almost assuredly not. Are there Liberals involved in this mess, even beyond Han Dong (who no longer sits as a Liberal)? I’d bet every dime and dollar. But my interest here isn’t partisan, it’s patriotic.

I want to know if there’s a traitor in Parliament. I just don’t know if naming the allegedly dirty MPs gets us closer or farther from that goal. The naming of Dong last year in multiple Sam Cooper stories (more on him later) didn’t serve to inform the population, it brought about a libel suit that’ll be heard sometime between now and my death. We don’t know anything, and tossing a list of dirty MPs out there that will be used to equate having bussed in Chinese residents or signed up foreign students at a college campus for a nomination race with people who gave crucial information to enemies doesn’t seem to help us.

At some point we need to have a conversation, a real conversation where frankly white people like me aren’t the leaders, about the intersection of increased immigration, ethnic politics, and the influence of back home on Canadians here. I’m not suggesting that non-white Canadians are less Canadian than my Scottish and Irish ancestry ass is, but there are obviously an element here that isn’t helped by the white nature of the commentariat.

What we need is answers to these specific issues, but a broader discussion of the fact that we are a different country today than we were when twenty years ago matters. If we want to sustain our diversity, a strength that I cherish, we have to strengthen our institutions to protect against foreign interference but also strengthen our ability to talk about heavily-non white seats without sounding like fucking morons. And that’s what is most concerning about all of this.

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The original Sam Cooper story on Han Dong – that the Liberals were warned mere days before the nominations close in 2019 about Dong, which has been confirmed by the principals – included a line that I’ll never forget. Dong emerged, in the words of whatever CSIS lackey wrote the memo that Coop wrote up, “suddenly and suspiciously” for the Don Valley North Liberal nomination. Dong was a former Ontario MPP who had Adam Vaughan – who we all thought was going to hold that seat indefinitely – blocking his path to Parliament. And then a seat opened up, and he ran north. You can have objections to that kind of carpetbagging but Jagmeet Singh carpetbagged from Brampton to Burnaby for political reasons and nobody’s calling him suspicious. Politicians moving to try and further their careers is not suspicious. If your spy agency thinks it is, that brings their entire credibility into disrepute.

Without that assessment, I’d be more likely to give this intel the benefit of the doubt, but intel isn’t just a list of facts, it’s a person’s interpretation of facts. It’s in the same vein as how differently we all hear the same words differently depending on the deliverer. CSIS, as any intel agency, relies on its agents not being fucking idiots. Their trust with the public relies on us not doubting what they say on that basis as well. And it’s hard, if that’s what CSIS thought of Dong, to know whether every assessment they make is this stupid.

But this is why I don’t want to get into the weeds of any possible allegation. People are trying to figure out the list, and I’m sure in enough time we’ll see it pieced together through public tells. Parties aren’t going to be able to keep accused members in prominent positions, and at some point if there are prominent frontbenchers in any party involved I’m sure their parties will tip their hands in time. But more importantly, how do we handle this so that the butt end of every government doesn’t see some tactical leak of allegations?

Is the answer hiving off foreign interference from the remit of the RCMP and creating some separate organization with powers to investigate this that has dedicated officers and budget? Is the answer to boost RCMP budgets to deal with this? How do we get community groups to trust CSIS and the RCMP to actually go to them if they see things that aren’t on the level? And should all political parties change the rules around nominations?

I have my answers on all of those, and I don’t think there’s a need for a US style primary system that would cost millions and also run contrary to the very nature of Westminster democracy, which is to say that elections are not fixed. Primaries work in the US because there’s no risk that there’ll be a Presidential election in June. It’s much harder to do here when the election could be in 16 months or 16 weeks. But at least thinking about whether there needs to be systemic changes is a more worthwhile exercise than hoping that there are more traitors in your opposition’s ranks than your own.

There’s been a very serious failure here. These are dark times. I get it if you want the names out there above all else, and I certainly get feeling betrayed. I certainly do. But at the end of the day, we can wallow in the feeling of perceived betrayal and yell about how awful the other side is, content to know there’s no definitive proof our side isn’t implicated officially yet, or we can try and make this better. I find myself less interested in the traitors in our midst now, and much more interested in stopping any more. We’ll rid ourselves of our current failures soon enough. Any future traitors are on us. Let’s not let there be any.